


a hundred miles through the desert, repenting

by gsparkle



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, Missing Scene, Post-Avengers (2012)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-13 08:44:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9115552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gsparkle/pseuds/gsparkle
Summary: The battle is over, but the clean up has just begun. Maria Hill supervises as the world spins on.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KByrd](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KByrd/gifts).



> Written for the 2016 CapHill Secret Santa exchange!
> 
> This was originally conceived as a series of missing scenes, but time just wasn't on my side this holiday season. I reeeally struggled with this one and ultimately don't think I did too well in terms of sticking to the prompt, but I tried and I hope you like it, anyway? 
> 
> Title is from ["Wild Geese" by Mary Oliver](http://www.phys.unm.edu/~tw/fas/yits/archive/oliver_wildgeese.html). Continued, endless love and appreciation to santiagoinbflat.

“Because we’ll need them,” Maria mimics to herself as she walks away from Fury. Dramatic asshole, always standing in big windows and making ridiculous, impossible statements. What kind of colossal ego must the man have to presume the nightmare team of misfits he just unleashed on the world is ever going to return? Already, Thor has taken off for another dimension, Stark has spirited Banner away without any sort of tracking device, and even Barton and Romanoff have gone off the reservation. Hell, Fury let Rogers, a bona fide _national treasure,_ ride off on a motorcycle without so much as a helmet, let alone a driver’s license. A collection of loose cannons like that isn’t going to come running back because Fury throws up a Bat Signal. _“Because we’ll need them?” Give me a goddamn break._

There’s not exactly a ton of time to stew about this or any of the other infuriating things Nick’s done in the last few days, though, because her Helicarrier is gasping for life, Manhattan is literally on fire, and _someone_ has to fix it. “Get me the hangar bay,” she snaps at one of the agents hovering anxiously around her command station. “I want all quinjets back to base, immediately. _You,_ get me the Port Authority; _you,_ get me Engineering. I need all reserve agents in the tri-state area called in for damage control ASAP.” She issues directives until the crowd dissipates, wishing she could slump against her holoboard, or better yet, escape to her quarters and bury herself in bed. Sometimes in her nightmares, she can get her dream self into bed and the resulting paradox shakes her awake, safe against the throbbing hum of the helicarrier engines. Maybe, if she can get into bed, she’ll wake up sweaty and terrified, but the Avengers will still be nonexistent and the Chitauri will still be wherever the fuck they came from and Manhattan will still be its usual shitty self and Phil will still be alive.

“Agent Hill?” Sitwell’s voice yanks her back to the bridge. “We have a situation on the ground.”

Maria directs her stare upwards in futile hope of patience. _“Another_ one?”

Sitwell shuffles his feet. “It’s Captain Rogers, ma’am.”

“Captain Rogers left the secured Tesseract departure zone 38 minutes ago,” Maria reminds him, glancing down at her holoboard to confirm. “Fury issued a mandate that we’re not to track him, so you don’t need to be keeping tabs on him. I can find you an alternate assignment--”

“It’s not that, ma’am, it’s--” He scratches the shiny crown of his head in bemusement. “He’s at Grand Central, and the agents can’t get him to leave.”

It would be unprofessional to kick her command station in frustration, but it’s tempting. “Patch me through to supervising agent,” Maria sighs instead. Sitwell rushes off and, a minute later, she’s face to face with a lieutenant whose face is smeared with ash and dust. “What’s the problem, agent?”

“Look,” says the lieutenant, turning the camera away from herself. The feed is grainy, but the profile of Steve Rogers is unmistakable. As Maria watches, he lifts a hunk of granite above his head, then tosses it onto a nearby pile. “People are lining up to watch.” Indeed, there are a few New Yorkers in the corner of the shot, disregarding the aftermath of destruction around them in favor of getting a photo of Captain America ripping a sleeve as he strains to move another piece of the rubble.

Given the opportunity, Maria would have happily taken that gorgeous motorcycle of his and gotten the hell out of town. Why he’s given that chance up, she doesn’t know, but here’s what she does: there’s more damage than she has agents, and there’s a World Security Council page at her elbow that she can’t ignore for much longer. “This is good publicity,” she tells the lieutenant. “As long as he’s helping, he can stay.” Ending the transmission, Maria waits for the WSC page to say something; and when he doesn’t, she strides away, not looking back to see if he follows.

When the world narrowly avoids going to shit, blame continues to fly through the air far after the battle is over. For hours, Maria sits in a “debrief” that is really a poorly concealed interrogation. The WSC wants someone to set out for the media like so much fresh meat, and once it becomes clear that Maria won’t be bullied into that position, they press for a replacement.

“Nick Fury?” they try, clearly expecting her to roll over in hopes of a promotion. This is exactly why the Council has always been a collection of gutless idiots, because they assume everyone else is just as power-hungry as they are. They have, it seems, no concept of the loyalty that Fury inspires, of the idea that she’s never once stabbed someone in the back. “The Avengers?” they next suggest; frustrating, because the team name leaves a sour taste on her tongue, and yet they certainly did more good than the careless collection of suits she’s currently facing. There is nothing Maria would like better than to sell Tony Stark and his stupid goatee down the river, but even she has to admit that he did, ultimately, singlehandedly save New York from a nuclear disaster, and that such action merits protection.

“You’re the morons who tried to nuke Manhattan,” she tells them. “Which has to be the most idiotic tactical decision I’ve ever seen. You want to call the Avengers reckless, and then you bomb the biggest city in the country? Whose idea was that? Not to mention--I mean, you _know_ this is SHIELD, right? We record _everything._ I’m thinking the public might not like to learn how close they came to being annihilated by a council of spineless assholes all comfortably removed from the situation. Think about that the next time you come for Nick Fury.” There’s spluttering outrage as she shoves her chair back and stalks out, but even though mouthing off to the Council wasn’t the smartest choice she’s ever made, Maria can’t bring herself to care.

Fury’s back on the bridge when she returns, wearing a smirk and that stupid trenchcoat he _knows_ she hates. “How’d it go?” he asks. She knows him well enough to see the wariness he thinks is hidden behind his dark eyes.

“Threw you under the bus, sir,” Maria says cheerfully. “Should have your job by tomorrow.” If she wanted his job, she could have had it, and they both know it; but what, exactly, is the point of leading an international espionage organization if you still have to bow down to a council of CEOs?

Fury smiles and the creases smooth off his forehead. “Well,” he says with what could pass as a chuckle, “Until that transition goes through, I’ve got a few things for us to work on.” He holds his hand out automatically for the folio that Phil would usually automatically hand over; but there is no Phil in his blind spot, and Fury looks down with a sigh.  “I’ve made arrangements for Phil,” he says soberly, gaze drifting out to the clouds. “It’s all taken care of. The President has requested a briefing, so I’m off to Washington. I need you to go down to the city and check in with the clean-up crews on the ground, and then meet me at the Guest House.”

“Sir?” The Guest House hasn’t been operative in years.

It’s an enigmatic smile she receives this time. “All in good time, Hill,” he promises, sweeping off the bridge. “All in good time.”

Maria Hill didn’t join SHIELD to learn all its secrets, but there’s nothing she hates more than being left in the dark. As usual, he’s gone before she can demand more information, so she bites back the sigh and heads for the quinjet hangar. Despite the fact that New York airspace is a complete security clusterfuck, the silence she finds in her quinjet is the most peace Maria has had in about a week, and she regrets having to set her jet down in the middle of Times Square and reintroduce her ears to clanging clatter of a city in crisis.

Most of the civilians have been evacuated for clean up, but there are still triage centers dotting the streets, and steel girders of collapsed buildings continue to groan ominously into alleys. It’s hard to look at the destruction that’s been wrought, but Maria forces herself to keep her eyes open, to not avert her eyes from the legs twisted at wrong angles or the single arm that sticks out from a caved-in bodega, still reaching helplessly from the other side of death. It is, she feels, her duty to bear witness to the horror that still happened even though they saved the world; and so, as the sun hides from the tragedy, as she moves from one SHIELD clean-up site to the next, she refuses to look away. She lends a hand where she can and summons ambulances or supply trucks where she can’t. She tells site leaders, “Let me know if you’re not getting what you need,” over and over, until her throat cracks and she chokes on the cement dust that swirls in the air.

She travels clockwise through the area, ending up at Grand Central station sometime around midnight. Much of the fight took place here, mostly due to the fact that Stark’s phallic compensation of a tower stands directly above. Tonight, the tower is dark, and enormous halogen lights flood the piles of rubble at its base. More than any other, this site resembles a kicked anthill, agents scrambling over unsteady mounds of debris. The site superviser, when Maria locates her, is vaguely familiar; however, most people are when she’s been awake for 24 hours straight. It’s only when the lieutenant, at the end of her report, adds, “And Captain Rogers is on his thirteenth hour,” that she remembers.

“He’s _still_ here?”

“Y-yes, ma’am,” stammers the lieutenant under Mari’s incredulous stare. “I--we tried to get him to stop, but Director Fury’s mandate said to leave him alone, so--” Her teeth worry her lip and it’s clear she fears some sort of punishment for letting Captain America, technically a 95-year-old war veteran, work long hours of hard labor.

Maria digs up a tired smile. “From what I understand, he’s more stubborn than a mule. Let me try talking to him--your crew has enough to worry about already.” Relief stands out on the lieutenant’s face, mingling there with the sweat and grime of the day, and after receiving directions to where Captain Rogers is toiling, Maria dismisses the woman with a reminder of the impending night shift staff arrival.

The pit is narrow but deep, more like a crevasse that’s opened up in front of the train station. There is a string of agents arranged like a bucket brigade down the opening, working together under enormous halogen lights to heft the heavy granite that has surely been easily handed off to them. As she makes her careful way down, Maria sends each to take a well-deserved break until, at last, she and Captain Rogers are the only ones left under the light.

In the twelve or so hours since she saw first saw footage of the captain’s clean up efforts, he’s managed to lose the ripped shirt and cover himself in the same dust and ash that clings to everyone else. Unlike her SHIELD agents, Captain Rogers wears the grime like an 80s action hero, the dust lingering lovingly on the planes of muscles that curve under his skin. He works methodically, grabbing a hunk of granite and swinging to throw it onto a nearby pile, and for a moment Maria stands entranced by the rhythm of his work, the elegance and grace he moves with even in backbreaking labor.

It’s almost peaceful, and she’s almost forgotten why she’s there, and then he pauses to wipe his brow and the mesmerizing cadence finally loses its hold on her. “Captain,” Maria says, her tired vocal cords straining to keep a note of authority in her tone. “A moment of your time, please.”

As it turns out, the musculature of his back, fascinating though it is, can’t compete with his abs, or the way his blue eyes and quick smile brighten his grubby face. “Ma’am,” he says, all politeness as he walks his latest boulder over to the rubble pile, “If you’re here to send me home, I’m afraid the answer is still no.” Despite his refusal, his eyelids droop as he considers the pile he’s built, then the hole he’s cleared into the Grand Central terminal. “I’m not one to shirk responsibility.”

Maria levels an even look at him, then finds a particularly large rock to sit on and stares expectantly at him until he folds his long legs up under him and drops down next to her. Up close, she can practically hear the tension that bunches his muscles together, shrieking so loudly that there is no way he can’t hear it; more likely, he’s ignoring it. “Aren’t you tired?” she asks, and he starts, gaze shaking away from the hole in the wall.

“Everyone’s tired,” he deflects with a shrug.

“Sure,” Maria agrees, fighting the urge to check her watch. “But not everyone is you.”

Captain Rogers bristles, eyes narrow. “I’m not _special,”_ he says. “I don’t need to be handled with kid gloves. These people are working their asses off, and I’ve got no right to do any less than them.”

Not that she’s all rah-rah superheroes, or anywhere near it, but Maria rather thinks that, after squashing an alien takeover lead by an intergalactic megalomaniac, most people would be more than happy to grant him such a right. And, while she’s impressed that he doesn’t share the rest of his team’s apparent irresponsibility for the destruction they wrought, it’s irresponsibility of a different kind, she thinks, for him to work himself into the ground.

“No kid gloves here.” Maria holds up her hands, bare and crisscrossed with dirt and scars. “I’m not here to treat you gently. I honestly have twenty other things to do, and this conversation is keeping me from all of them, so: I don’t think you’re special, but I do _know_ that you’re different. These agents have been swapping out with each other for hours, taking breaks and getting rest because it’s what their bodies need. I know you can go farther and lift more than anyone else, but those muscles aren’t going to do you much good if they don’t have any fuel.” She pulls out a power bar and holds it pointedly between them. “When was the last time you ate, Cap?”

He does his best to avoid looking at her, but only a minute passes before he holds out his hand in defeat. “I don’t know,” he admits, unwrapping the snack with a sigh. “Yesterday?”

Maria’s eyes widen in spite of herself. _“Yesterday?_ Rogers--”

“I know!” he tells her, hunching his shoulders as he sheepishly crams the entire power bar into his mouth at once and chews hard. “Does it help if I say I ate a big breakfast?”

“It does not,” Maria says, exasperated.

A self-deprecating smile pulls up the corners of his mouth. “I didn’t think so,” he sighs. Somewhat defensively he adds, “You know, when Loki had Agent Barton, _he_ didn’t get to eat anything.”

“Because Loki is a sadistic kidnapping _murderer,”_ Maria points out. “And SHIELD cares at least a little bit about its agents. Look, Rogers,” and because it’s the middle of the night and she’s too exhausted to think about protocol, she reaches over and sets a hand one the nearest of his massive shoulders, “Listen, I’m not here to tell you not to work. You want to lift rocks all day, hey, no skin off my nose; in fact, you’d be doing me a favor. I just need you to understand that my agents have too much work to do here without also having to worry about a geriatric war veteran who refuses to take care of himself. If you’re not going to rest or eat appropriately, then you’re a hazard to this operation and you’ll have to leave. Are we clear, Captain?”

He looks at his feet for a while, then around at the work he’s accomplished. Maria’s hand is still on his (very firm, very muscular, very distracting) shoulder, and just when she thinks it’s probably been there too long, he puts his hand over hers, just for a second, and turns. For one stupid moment she thinks the little grin on his lips means he’s going to kiss her, and for one additionally stupid moment she considers letting it happen. This is exactly why she always gets eight hours of sleep, because otherwise she gets slap-happy and, apparently, weirdly romantic in the most inappropriate situations.

Thankfully, he doesn’t catch on to her stupidity, and merely says, “God, this reminds me of the war,” in horribly bittersweet nostalgia. Maria knows that her reputation at SHIELD is a cold one, but at least part of that comes from the fact that she has no idea what to do with the emotions of others. Now doesn’t seem like the right time to learn, either, so she quirks her lip and squeezes his bicep in sympathy before standing.

“You should come with me, Captain,” she says as kindly as she knows how. “Maybe escaping the pit for a few hours will help.”

He slaps his hands on his knees and stands with a little huff. Standing right next to him, she’s surprised to find him much taller than her first estimate, and broader in a way that isn’t doing any favors for the stupid corner of her brain, especially when he leans over to stretch. “Maybe I need a break after all,” he says ruefully over his shoulder as they clamber awkwardly out of the pit. “Maybe I--”

As soon as his soot-streaked head pokes above the line of the ground, a thunderous applause breaks out. Every agent stationed at this clean up site, plus a good number more from the others, has filled the area to its perimeter. As she is following the captain out, Maria can see an embarrassed pink flush spill down his bare back. He turns, bemusement bright in his eyes, and asks, “So I guess this is why you wanted to hurry me out?”

Maria shrugs. “No, but I’m not surprised. They appreciate everything you’ve done. You _are_ a superhero, after all.”

From the way he looks confusedly down at himself, she guesses that he forgets, sometimes. “Right,” he says. “Right.” He turns back with a sort of determined cheer to his smile and climbs out of the pit, shaking this one’s hand, high fiving that one, blushing furiously the whole time. Maria follows at a more sedate pace, waiting around until the crowds thin out, waiting longer than she really needs to because… well, because _someone_ needs to make sure Nick Fury’s second-favorite historical artifact eats, right?

“Captain,” she says eventually, when he’s shaking the last agent’s hand. “Do you have somewhere to stay?”

“Steve,” he insists with a tired smile. “I’m not in the Army anymore. And yes, I can stay at the Tower, although…” Maria waits, eyebrows raised in question, and he confesses, “I’m starving. Is there a diner around here?”

Maria swipes past the low-priority alerts on her watch for a map. “Three blocks away,” she confirms with a nod. This would seem to be the end of the interaction, but he’s still staring at her, uncertain. When he says nothing, she adds, “Is there something else I can help you with, Steve?”

Steve ducks his head a little. “Would, ah--would you like to come with me?” He looks up sly through his lashes. “When was the last time _you_ ate, Agent Hill?”

Maria sends him a (mostly) friendly side-eyed glare and swipes at her watch again. She really should be on her way to meet Fury at the Guest House, but--

“I suppose I could eat something,” she acknowledges, ignoring the yowls rising from her stomach. Steve smiles and goes off (regrettably) to find a shirt while Maria does some fast travel time math. If she eats quickly, she’ll still be in the air within the hour. If she doesn’t--well, Nick Fury can wait just this once.


End file.
